


The Gamble

by nightsofreylo



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: F/M, Jedi!Rey, Post Redemption Arc, Sex on the Falcon, Strip Poker, Strip Sabacc
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-11
Updated: 2016-02-11
Packaged: 2018-05-19 16:18:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5973871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightsofreylo/pseuds/nightsofreylo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Whenever you gamble, eventually you lose...</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Gamble

Ben Solo tilts back on his chair, balancing precariously as his eyes skim over the set of cards in his hand. Rey reaches out in the Force, testing the barrier in his mind. He draws her in, teasingly close, and then…nothing. “I do believe you are cheating, Master Rey,” he murmurs, glancing up at her with dark eyes. “And it is against the Jedi Code to cheat.”

“But not to gamble?” Rey grins back. “You only say that because you're losing.” Her eyes roam the bare expanse of his chest, and he leans forward casually with his elbows against the Sabacc table. The hum of the Falcon’s drive rumbles beneath them, the only sound except for their voices and the occasional surprised beep from BB-8 whenever an unexpected card is pulled from the deck. 

“This game is considerably harder with only two players,” he tells her, unfazed, but she can see the uncertainty in his eyes. His cloak and gloves are on the floor behind him, along with his boots and his recently-discarded shirt. He is trying to read her, not with the Force (they’d agreed that the game would be considerably more fun without it), but through observation. He scans her features for even the slightest change of expression, trying to find a tell. She is confident that he won’t find one, and knows the game well enough to know that she has a _good_ hand. She draws a card from the deck, and it becomes an even better hand.

She calls. He shows her his cards. She has twenty-two against his eighteen. He stands, all two meters of him, and suddenly her throat goes dry. When she’d agreed to gambling this way, it had only been as a pastime, entertainment on the long trip from Coruscant to Ahch-to. She had assumed she would win, and her assumption so far had been correct. She just hadn’t considered the implications of him losing to her…

He removes his black pants, beneath which she catches only the faintest glimpse of practical, fitted flight-shorts that show entirely too much, the same kind Resistance pilots wear under their flightsuits…and then she forces her eyes back to his face. He sits back down, re-assuming the two-legged position on his chair, looking entirely too casual. Heat rises into her cheeks and he, mercifully, says nothing.

The computer deals, and she prays for bad cards. No such luck. She trades, and receives the Mistress, and the round after that her trade yields the Commander. It’s as though the system is stacked against him. And then, incredibly, she draws the Queen of Air and Darkness. _Kriffing hell…_ she thinks. She should call. He will know, once the cards are shown, if she doesn’t call. He is looking at her expectantly, waiting for her decision, and her eyes linger for just a moment too long on his form. He is powerfully built, broad-shoulders tapering to narrow hips and strong thighs. She realizes, with a sudden thrum of desire, that she wants him.

She tries to keep her voice steady. “I call.”

“I raise,” he says quietly, and she is taken aback. She has Pure Sabacc. He can’t be serious.

“You don’t have anything to raise with…” she points out delicately, trying not to let her eyes wander to the last piece of clothing he has on.

“True,” he says finally, and there is a quiet strain to his voice she has never heard before.

“Show of cards?” she questions, uncertain for the first time since the game had begun.

“I don’t need to see yours,” he murmurs, and reveals his hand to her: the Idiot, the two of Sabers…the three of Staves. An Idiot’s Array. The only hand that could beat hers - the hand that beats all other hands - a game-ending hand. His face is unreadable. She stands, and his dark eyes follow her form. “Rey…”

She ignores the warning in his tone and tells herself that her name on his tongue doesn’t affect her, letting her grey jacket fall to the floor, followed by her shirt. She is suddenly envious of his self-assurance, of the casual way in which he presents his body to her, calm and controlled. She hesitates, hands trailing the place where the flat of her stomach meets fabric, and her gaze flickers up from the floor. Ben’s body is taut, rigid, his right hand clenched into a fist…her breath catches in her chest, and his eyes linger over the skin that has been bared to him.

“Come here,” he says quietly.

She can’t move…she can’t think. The game is forgotten.

“Please do not make me ask you again, Master Jedi,” he says again, the strain in his voice and his forced formality bringing her back to him. Against his own words, he stands, moving closer to _her_ , but she steps away, just out of his reach.

“I’m not done yet,” Rey says quietly, choosing her words carefully so that he will understand she is not rejecting him. For the first time, she lets herself look at him, not with a quick, shy glance, but boldly and curiously. She feels his desire for her in the Force, reads it in his eyes, and it fuels her courage. Her eyes move from his face - from the dark eyes, the prominent nose, the visceral scar that runs from his brow to his jawline, the unusual dusting of freckles - and then lower, to the planes of his chest, all complimentary hollows and harsh angles. And then to the place between his thighs where the outline of his cock is straining against the fabric of his undergarments. She bites her lip, dragging her eyes back up reluctantly to his face, her breathing unsteady.

He looks at her warily…he has not expected this of her, hasn’t expected her to want him in return. She lets her hands settle once again over the band of her pants, and his jaw clenches imperceptibly and he tilts his head to the side, an unspoken thought passing between them: _Only if you want._ And she does want, she wants in a way that is completely unfamiliar to her, and so she moves closer. “I want to kiss you,” she says quietly.

“Rey,” he murmurs, a reverent whisper that comes from somewhere deep in his chest, and then he presses his mouth against hers. It is gentle, a question against her lips, and her answer is to push into him harder, to drag her hands through his hair and force his mouth to slant against hers. She has only felt his body aligned against hers this way once before, years ago on Starkiller…but that had been a struggle for power and control, for dominance, while this is something else entirely. She is not sure who bends first, or if they both submit to each other, but his mouth leaves hers, trailing down her jaw, over her collarbone, pressing a line of kisses to her stomach, and somehow she winds up with her back against the console of the ship. He drops to his knees, his hands gripping the backs of her thighs, pausing to look up at her from under dark, thick lashes, and for a moment she thinks he means to have her there, in the cockpit of her ship. The idea thrills her.

But then he is standing again, pressing his mouth against hers until she opens her mouth to him. He lifts her and she wraps her arms around his shoulders, her legs around his hips, and she whimpers at the feeling of him, hard and heavy and pressed against her. “You don’t want…?” she asks breathlessly, and he groans against the words.

“Not here.”

“There’s a double bunk-“ she starts to offer, thinking of the large, unused sleeping quarters that would better accommodate both of them.

He laughs against her throat, pressing a kiss there. “Rey, that’s not going to happen.”

“Oh,” she remembers suddenly. _Right. Ben_ Solo.

He carries her with long strides, only pausing occasionally to push her against a wall and kiss her, as if reminding himself of her taste. They reach his quarters, and his hand fumbles with the code; he curses impatiently, and then steps back, and she feels him reach out in the Force for the door’s internal mechanism. It hisses open to reveal the sparse, dimly lit bunk. It is not unlike her own quarters, meant for sleeping and not much else. He sets her gently down on the ground, and then he lets his hands drift up her sides, over her breasts, hidden from him by the thin fabric of her bindings. “Let me…?” he murmurs.

She turns, and expects to find his fingers at the closure of her wrap. Instead, they weave into her hair, gently pulling it out of the ties that secure it, letting it tumble over his hands and her shoulders. “Do you know how long I’ve wanted to do that?” he asks her, and she shakes her head. With her back to him, she can’t see his face, but his voice is low and deep and it strikes every chord inside her. “A very, very long time.”

Only then do his hands move to her fastenings, and he turns her so that he can look at her. His gaze is almost too intimate, and her breasts rise and fall with her breathing. She feels exposed, waiting for him like this. He moves forward, putting one hand on either side of her face, tilting her head up so that she cannot avoid his gaze. “Have you done this before?” he asks.

“No,” she replies simply. “Have you…?”

“I have not,” he says, and something about that admission scares and excites her. “You’ll tell me,” he murmurs, “if there is anything you don’t want?”

His gentleness burns through her, and she says, “And if there’s something I want?”

“Anything,” he whispers, his voice raw and powerful. “Anything, Rey.”

“Earlier, I thought you might…” She falters, uncertain how to phrase her request. The image of him on his knees in the cockpit, his hands on the back of her thighs, his mouth hovering so very close to where she had wanted him-

A groan rips past his lips, as if her though has pained him. “Rey, you might yet kill me.”

“If you don’t want-“

He silences her with a kiss, searching her mouth and her mind, and then his hands guide her, pushing her gently back down against the firm weight of the bunk. He covers her with his body, altogether too large for this enclosed space, and with two of them there is a momentary uncertainty about how exactly to do this. But then his hands on her hips angle her and she feels his fingers dragging that last scrap of clothing down her legs, lingering on her skin. She is bare before him, his rough hands grasping her thighs, and then his mouth is working over her, tongue laving at her clit, dragging along her sensitive folds, teeth biting at the inside of her thigh. His name falls from her lips, a soft chorus of _Ben_ echoing in his mind, and he feels her shudder against him when he thrusts his tongue inside of her instinctively, loving the soft _‘oh’_ that escapes from her lungs. He realizes through their connection that she can feel the rough, uneven flesh of his burn-scar against her sensitive skin, and he wonders if it might be repulsive to her.

As if to drive that thought from his mind, her fingers thread into his hair, and he can’t think beyond the feeling of her thighs around his head, of the taste of her on his tongue. He doesn’t stop until she begs him to, until the hand in his hair forces him away, and then his hand replaces his tongue and he coaxes her gently to her orgasm. When she comes, she cries out into the hollow between his neck and shoulder - but he won’t have that, he has to see her, to watch her come undone - and opens her legs to let his fingers push into her deeper, first one and then another, until finally she stills against his hand.

“Rey,” he says quietly, and pulls back - god, but he loves the sound she makes when his fingers leave her heat, a low, disappointed sound. He can feel her through the Force, feel her arousal and her _emptiness_ , the ache that pools inside her. She drags the material of his underwear over his cock, down his hips. Her nails bite into his skin as she removes this last offending item of clothing. _  
_

“Show me,” she whispers, pulling him back to her, and he moves so that she is above him, her knees straddling his hips. He can feel her wetness against him. She pulls away and the loss of her is visceral. “Show me,” she says again, this time with more confidence. He takes her hand and wraps it around his cock, encircling it with his own. Her touch nearly undoes him, her hand small but strong in his own, rough from many years of harsh living. Slowly, he drags their hands up and down his length, until she takes his wrist and pushes it away, finding a rhythm that is her own. He thrusts up into her hand involuntarily, and then, almost against his will, the words are torn from his lips: “Rey, I need to be inside you.”

Her hand doesn’t leave him. Instead, it guides him to her. It takes every bit of self control he possesses to wait for her, to let her move in her own time. She takes the tip of him inside her, and then slowly pushes her hips down, letting herself adjust to the fullness, the way he stretches her. He watches her eyes flicker down to where they are joined together, and hells if that isn’t the most innocent thing he’s ever seen. The last reserve of restraint inside him breaks, and he takes her hips and moves so that she is beneath him, her hair dark against the stark white sheets. He kisses her, drawing his cock out of her, and then pushes gently back in. She tight around him, and it feels so familiar that he has to remind himself that this is new, that she has never done this, and forces himself to move in slow, controlled thrusts. She cries out against him each time he enters her, and he lives for those small, soft sounds…for the way her hips tilt up to meet his, for the way her body seems to tighten around his cock as if she wants to keep him inside of her…

“Ben, please,” she is whispering, pleading with him. At first, he's not sure what she’s asking for. “You won’t…it doesn’t hurt, I promise…please…I need more…”

“Force,” he chokes out, the desperation in her voice nearly sending him over the edge. And then he gives into her, his slow, controlled thrusts replaced by the harsh, unsteady surge of his hips against hers. Pleasure rips through him, violent and relentless. Something shifts between them so that he is aware of her in a way that he has never been before: the fragility of the small bones in her wrist, the flecks of green in her eyes, the callouses on her fingertips and palms as they drag over his skin. Her spirit flickers at the edges of his consciousness, her mind bright and brilliant, burning through him, and it’s that searing presence that sends him over the edge. She tightens around him, and he spills into her, burying himself inside her.

Her fingers drag through his hair, gentle and soothing down his neck, her own breathing as unsteady as his own. She is spent, shaking, dark pupils wide. He wonders how he looks to her. He wonders if she knows that she has wrecked him as thoroughly as he has her. She whimpers when he finally pulls out of her, at the loss of him inside her. Something tightens in his chest, an almost painful recognition of how much he needs her, of how much he…. He shuts his eyes against the weight of that emotion, trying to regain control.

“Ben…I’m not going anywhere,” she says, fingers tracing over his brow, his cheekbones, his jaw.

“You weren’t supposed to hear that,” he groans quietly, opening his eyes.

“Is that…not how you feel?” she asks softly, and he catches the resigned emptiness behind her words, the fear that tugs at her mind. _She’s afraid_ , Ben realizes suddenly, his blood running cold. _She’s afraid that I’m going to leave her, like everyone else…_

He takes her hand and presses it to his chest, that small point of contact so seemingly insignificant when they have shared their bodies with each other. But with her palm pressed against his skin she can feel the pounding of his heart, the way his pulse quickens beneath her touch. She thinks of Jakku, of a desert sparrow that had become trapped in the skeleton of a fallen destroyer: his heart is like that, fluttering and pounding against the frame of his chest, singing a low, quiet note that sounds like her name.

“That’s how I feel,” he says quietly.

 

In the morning, they put each other back together, and Rey wonders if the act of dressing another person is always so intimate. Ben finds them both fresh clothes, pressing quick kisses to her skin before it is hidden from him once more. There is the hushed working of fingers against closures and buckles and clasps, the smoothing of wrinkled fabric. He drags his fingers through her hair and she shivers, wondering if the act of dressing will be in vain, but then he finds a comb and arranges it neatly into the three buns that adorn the back of her head. When they are both finally presentable, she lands the Falcon on the small island, and quiets the drives.

Rey doesn’t let him see her pocket the Queen of Air and Darkness before she follows him off of the ship.


End file.
